


a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

by milkteeth1



Series: Whumptober 2020 [2]
Category: Marble Hornets
Genre: Doctors, Emetophobia, Hallucinations, Nightmares, Seizures, Texting, Vomit, Whumptober 2020, self harm mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:40:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26798242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/milkteeth1/pseuds/milkteeth1
Summary: Tim's not having a great day.
Series: Whumptober 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948756
Kudos: 12





	a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

**Author's Note:**

> hi, this has a bit of code in it 👀. the link to the ceaser shift is right here - https://cryptii.com/pipes/caesar-cipher
> 
> during Tim's hallucination, anything italicized means it's the hallucination while anything not means it's the real world and Tim actually thinking. just didn't want anyone to get confused :)
> 
> I hope you're enjoying it so far! I sure am

What an awful, horrible day. 

Tim had woken up with a migraine - as a result of the seizure he had last night. He hadn’t had the time to call Brian or Alex or even Jay (although he tried not to call him, since he seemed skittish at so much of a hand coming near him). He took some excedrine and called out of work for the day, going to take a nap. 

But he wasn’t able to sleep, because when he tried to lie down he ended up lurching over the bed and throwing up whatever he had eaten for dinner last night. All over his fresh, vacuumed, clean carpet. And now he had to clean it up. 

“Fuck,” he mumbled, throwing off the blankets and sitting up, coughing harshly into his hand as he steadied himself on the bedframe, stepping over the puddle. 

Once he had cleaned it up, he settled himself back down in bed, but now he was too awake to sleep, and now he wasn’t going to get any sleep at all. Wonderful. So he sat up again, stepping on the wet puddle (gross) and making his way to the kitchen for a snack. 

His phone rang. 

Groaning, he grabbed it, seeing it was Alex. Not another fucking film day, not right now. He almost wanted to throw his phone onto the bed and not answer. But he did anyway, holding the phone to his ear.

“Hey! Are you free today?” Alex asked, voice chipper. God, how was he always in such a good mood?   
  
“Uh,” he started, trying to make up a lie. “I don’t know. I think I have food poisioning or something,”   
  
“Shit, that sucks. We’ll be at Rosswood if you wanna come on by later this afternoon. We can always film your parts later this week,”   
  
“Yeah, I might come by later if I’m feeling better. Can you tell Brian to text me?”

“Sure,” Alex said, some weird shuffling in the background. “Alright. Feel better, Tim,”   
  
“Thanks,” Tim said, hanging up the phone as he set it on the kitchen counter. He sighed, setting his head down on the counter, tired. 

_ Ding!  _

He looked up, opening his phone. It was from Brian. 

_ Bri: Hey, Alex said you weren’t feeling great. Are you OK? _

_ Tim: Kinda _

_ Tim: Had a seizure last night, threw up this morning  _

_ Bri: Shit  _

_ Bri: I’ll come by later _

_ Bri: Can’t leave rn  _

Tim sort of wished Brian would come over  _ now _ . He missed his friend; Brian was always swamped with work, Alex, more work, interns, work. Being a resident meant he barely had any time to hang with Tim. 

_ Bri: I don’t have work for the next few days. Wanna have a sleepover? _ _   
_ _   
_ Tim snorted. 

_ Tim: absolutely  _

_ Bri: awesome. Be over around 2. Text me if you throw up again or have another seizure  _

_ Tim: will do  _

Tim set down the phone again, feeling a bit nauseous at the thought of food. Oh, well, he’ll just take another nap. He coughed into his hand, going to his couch and putting on a dumb movie (Men in Black) and throwing a blanket over himself, shivering slightly as he fell asleep. 

_ DO YOU WANT TO BE CURED? _

_ I’m not sure what you’re saying. _

_ TIMOTHY, YOU ARE SICK. I CAN HELP YOU.  _

_ I don’t  _ want  _ help. I’m fine where I am.  _

_ IS THAT SO?  _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Mostly.  _

_ YOU ARE SURVIVING, NOT THRIVING. _

_ What does it matter to you? _

**_Hands like branches, reaching out and touching his skull, his head erupting in pain and feeling as if he was splitting open, spitting out the remnants of whatever was still in his stomach as he fell off the tree branch the roof the ledge, wrists slit open as the blood helped him slip into an eternal abyss_ **

“Fuck!” he cried, sitting up and surveying the room, shaking violently. There was a horrid smell emitting from the blanket, telling him that he had once again, puked all over himself. He shuddered, picking himself up off the couch and throwing the blanket into the washer. 

He went to the kitchen where his phone was, turning it on (it was 1pm, he was asleep for  _ hours _ ) and checking his messages. 

_ Bri: hey what’s with that text you just sent me? Are you OK?  _

_ Alex: hey you mind if I drop off the script at your house? I’ll put it in your mailbox  _

_ Alex: Scrap that I’ll get Brian to give it to you  _

Tim furrowed his brow. Text to Brian? He was out most of the day. There was no way. He pressed Brian’s contact, scrolling up the text history and seeing an empty text sent to Brian at 12:34 pm. There was no text in it. 

A knock at the door made him jump. 

He turned, opening the door and seeing Brian, who smiled at him.    
  
“Hey! I brought snacks. And my blanket,” he said, surveying Tim. “Are you OK?”   
  
“That’s the third time you’ve asked me that today,” Tim said quietly, letting his friend in, who shot him a concerned look.    
  
“I care about you, Tim,” Brian said, frowning at the couch. “You threw up again,”   
  
“Yeah? What about it?”   
  
He turned to face Brian, but  _ the room was gone - just him. Just him in the dark, empty room, voices erupting out of his brain and into the real world, whispering obscenities and vulgar phrases at him  _ as he tried to place where exactly he was in the house right now.    
  
_ I WANT TO HELP YOU. _

“I already told you, I don’t want your help,”

_ I CAN MAKE THIS ALL STOP. LET ME HELP.  _

_ “Pa'z h spl.” said one of the voices behind him. “Kvu'a spzalu av opt.” _ _   
_   
_ QUIET, WALKER.  _ _   
_ _   
_ _ A man with a static face, seemingly staring him down, arms and legs glitching out of place as he tried to walk forward, but the slender man grabbed him with it’s lanky arm, holding him steady. Walker (?) kept speaking, but Tim didn’t know what he was saying, he was speaking some sort of code that only _ Brian and Jay were able to solve. Brian? Where was Brian? Wasn’t he just here?   
  
_ “Iyphu pz olyl, jhss vba av opt, fvby nvk. Hyr huzdlyz huk fvb dpss ivd av opt,” Walker shouted, voice quiet but somehow spoken directly into his ear at the same time. He tried to move back, away from the voice, but something was holding him in place by his head, and suddenly he was on the surgeon's table, a hooded man standing over him with a scalpel, a sad face on the mask.  _

_ “T H E A R K A W A I T S Y O U,” the man said, bringing down the scalpel onto his head, cutting into the very consciousness that was Tim, his very essence and being, stripped away from him as the hooded man frowned at him. He was always frowning, never smiling, a shell of who he originally was. He was familiar, somehow, had he seen him before? _

And someone was shaking him, he awoke, Brian staring down at him with a worried expression, smiling tiredly.    
  
“Hey. You really scared me for a second. You went really deep into that hallucination,”   
  
“What?”   
  
“You were hallucinating,” Brian said, standing up and rummaging around the kitchen. “Kept mumbling about someone taking you to the Ark. Was that just something your brain made up?”   
  
“I don’t…” he trailed off, thinking about the hallucination. It seemd so vivid, so real, who was that static man? His friend handed him a glass of ice water. 

“Here. Sip on that. It’ll help you wake up. I’m going to go call Alex back, do you want me in here?”   
  
Tim shook his head, sipping on the ice water as Brian walked off into another part of the house, dialing Alex. He could only think about what that meant, what the Operator was trying to get out of him. 

What an awful, horrible day. 


End file.
